Songfacts®:

• The Canadian singer Sarah McLachlan penned this song from her 1988 debut album, Touch, after the death of a young friend left her devastated. Sarah explained in a 2005 interview for her iTunes Originals release: "'Ben's Song' was definitely a highlight for me. It was sort of one of the first songs I wrote where I really felt good about being a songwriter. As it was one of my first attempts, it was one of, I think, 10 or 11 songs that I wrote for that record, it was definitely the first time I felt like, 'Okay, I've done something good here. This feels really great.' And it was also a song that came out very quickly, and songwriting has never been easy for me. It's a slow, laborious process, and once in a blue moon a song comes out quickly and sort of the universe opens itself up to me and offers me this gift. And 'Ben's Song' was that time. I think it's just because I was so emotionally raw at that time. Ben was a child that I knew. He was 11 years old when he passed away. He had an inoperable brain tumor. I had spent a number of months with him everyday in childcare, taking care of him and hanging out with him and playing games with him and just being his friend. So we became very close. And he was the first person who was ever close to me that I had lost. I mean I had grandparents die but I had met them once in my life so there was never real emotional connection. So it was definitely really a strong emotional response to that whole thing and that's where it all came from."